Recent Actions

Bitcoin strikes me as useful in confronting libertarians with the consequences of their theories. It turns out that a truly unregulated market in money is epically boom-and-bust, intensely unequal, full of crooks, a means to make crime pay, and a...

I forgot to mention, basic income would also be slurped up by economic factors driving up the cost of minimal living (rent, food, etc) to meet it (because that's what the "market can bear"). Effectively whatever it was set at,...

I don't agree that Basic Income will do the job, for a number of reasons. First, because it will be held to mass misery levels by the same incentive calculus that keeps welfare at "mostly not dying on the street"....

Honestly, the whole "[other disease] won't be reversed by the treatment" thing is a red herring. If you survive another 100 years, they will be able to grow a new arm for you. Probably sooner. Likewise the price: governments will...

Comment Threads

The problem with alternative energy sources might be you are still USING energy, which could be used for different products, e.g.making aluminium. Which means you have to substitute, maybe with coal or like......

Actually, you've just described the biggest problem with Bitcoin, and it's not energy usage. It's the fact that enthusiasts think that their currency is abstract and conventional currency isn't! I first came across the concept of paper money (off $rare-thing standard) being an abstraction in Heinlein (I think probably "Time Enough for Love", but it must be at least 20 years since I last read any of his books other than "Starship Troopers")....

there are people out there with actual paper money in their actual wallets who never and will never ever have access to a cellphone much less a computer, Africans in places where there is little infrastructure have been using cell phone minutes as currency for years now, actually. http://gigaom.com/2007/05/27/in-africa-money-not-necessary-for-mobile-banking/ Note the date of the article....

You are totally correct to identify Bitcoin's weaknesses. I noted a few myself: http://alfidicapitalblog.blogspot.com/2013/12/the-serious-disadvantages-of-bitcoin.html It's too bad the Libertarian die-hards won't listen to rational arguments. Experimentation is always welcome in finance but crypto-currencies are going to fail when huge blockchains start crashing their transaction processing systems. Oh BTW, Bitcoin and HYIP frauds are now preying on each other: http://alfidicapitalblog.blogspot.com/2014/01/the-intersection-of-hyip-and-bitcoin.html That is the ultimate in hilarity....

If readers would really like to know about bit coin, law and economics scholar Jerry Brito of George Mason University has written on it. Bit coin volatility is due to the small number of venues using it, and its uncertain legal status. As more vendors accept it and its legality becomes clearer, it becomes less volatile. The idea that bit coin is deflationary in any significant sense is based in the author's assumption that it is the only currency in use in an economy, like a government monopoly currency. But it is only one of many crypto currencies and it...